Monday, December 7, 2009

Simplify the Season – Wrapping

Thanks for joining us on the journey to Simplify the Season. We're on week 7 of our journey. Can you believe it? It’s DECEMBER! We’re less than 3 weeks away from Christmas. We’ve planned for making family memories with traditions, planned what to bake and when, planned for Thanksgiving Dinner, Christmas Dinner, and even NEW YEAR’s! We’ve gone shopping, simplified taking portraits and sending cards. Whew! We’ve been busy! Thankfully we’ve been able to do all of this at our own weekly pace. We are ahead of the crowds. This WILL be a Simplified Season. You can do this!

You’ve already shopped. You have all the gifts. How do you get the gifts wrapped and keep it simple? Set up a gift wrap central if you have the space. Many of these ideas will work in just about any space! Whether it is your dining table, spare bedroom, rolling cart, closet, under bed box, (Elli’s annual) folding camp table, Big Orange 5 Gal bucket- get all of your wrap, bags, tissue, ribbons and bows into one space. This will make it easier to wrap gifts quickly, say --- during nap time or Sesame Street? Or maybe, for you, it is the sacred quiet between the time you get home and the time you need to start dinner? My personal choice is thick under the bed type bins that house my gift wrap and ribbons. I am able to balance them across adjacent dining chairs as I carefully wrap all the gifts upon my dining table. I keep extra supplies (like scissors and scotch tape) in the gift wrap bin year round.

After gifts are wrapped you will need a place to stash them. Those needing hand delivery (like teacher gifts) can go into a box/bin in the car – if you have chocolates in there and it is going to be some time before they are delivered, you may need to find a cool dry storage place out of the way in the air conditioning – linen closet or laundry room… or maybe just in the corner BEHIND the tree. Just keep those “gifts on the go” separate from all of the other under the tree gifts… just don’t forget where you have hidden them. If you are likely to forget where you stashed them, make a note in your agenda/planner/PDA.

A note on keeping gifts separate….

· Wrap each person’s gift with a different wrap.

Snowmen for Sarah and Santa for Alex. This is especially useful if you have more than one child and do not want them peeking at their gifts. They will not know which ones to open!

· Wrap to go gifts in a different wrap than gifts that are to be opened at home.

If “home” gifts are in red wrap, then “to go” gifts are in green… it is easy to spot what needs to be packed up from under the tree.

What are my other handy gift-wrapping ideas for you?

Some people need portability like bins that can be stashed away between wrapping sessions.

Others need a permanent set up (like in the corner of the laundry room).

Many moms need secrecy, like under-bed-storage-boxes that can be used on the bedroom floor and then stashed away quickly.

Wrap while they nap, if you can.

Sesame Street is a good hour of uninterrupted fun in our house! (Just make sure you start finishing up when you hear the Elmo’s World Theme!) Find your source of uninterrupted fun time and go!

What other ideas do you have for Gift Wrap Central, my friends?

If you are in the Jacksonville/St. Johns area and would like your home better organized, and would like the assistance of a professional organizer, e-mail juliebavi@gmail.com You can also find me on Facebook by clicking HERE or searching for Organize With Julie. Want to follow me on twitter? Find me @juliebavi.

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People often wonder what I actually DO as a professional organizer. I don’t come into your home and kick you out for 2 days while I reorder and repaint and redecorate everything in your home so that it is entirely new and non-functioning for you. I do work with you to help you find what strategies work for you. These strategies will enable you to: find your keys in the morning; find that file you know you had just yesterday; give you a place for everything; help you recognize the beauty in your space and your beauty within. We have fun along the way while we establish order to your chaos. In a nut shell, that’s what I do. Please feel free to contact me to find out more about what I can DO for you. Just follow my link to www.organizewithjulie.com